The Dicastery for the Eastern Churches is the Curial department responsible for dealing, on behalf of the Pope, with matters that affect the Eastern Catholic Churches, whose proper territories extend from Ethiopia to the Middle East, from Europe to India, and of all the diaspora communities which are children of these “sui iuris” Churches throughout the world.
By Alessandro Di Bussolo
The Dicastery for the Eastern Churches deals, on the Pope’s behalf, with those matters involving persons or things, that affect the sui iuris (autonomous) Eastern Catholic Churches. These Churches include territories extending from Ethiopia to the Middle East, from Europe to India, and include all the communities of their respective diasporas throughout the world.
The current prefect of the Dicastery is Claudio Cardinal Gugerotti; the current secretary, Archbishop Michel Jalakh, OAM.
Historical Notes
In 1573, Pope Gregory XIII established the Congregatio de rebus Graecorum, which was entrusted with the task of monitoring the lives of Catholics of the Byzantine or Greek rite, but also of promoting the faith among other Christians of the East. In 1862, Pius IX, established the Congregatio de Propaganda Fide pro negotiis ritus orientalis within the Sacra Congregatio de Propaganda Fide with similar responsibilities.
In 1917, Pope Benedict XV, with the Motu proprio Dei providentis, created the Congregation for the Eastern Church; in 1967, St Paul VI, with the Apostolic Constitution Regimini Ecclesiae Universae, changed the name to the Congregation for the Oriental Churches. The name was changed once again, to the Dicastery for the Eastern Churches, by Pope Francis in 2022, with the Apostolic Constitution Praedicate Evangelium.
Among the various magisterial documents, the following are essential for approaching the fascinating world of the Eastern Catholic Churches: The Apostolic Letter Orientalium dignitas, with which Pope Leo XIII in 1895 sought to safeguard the significance of Eastern traditions for the entire Church, highlighted the Holy See’s desire to protect their specific identities. In 1964, St Paul VI published the Second Vatican Council’s decree on the Eastern Catholic Churches, Orientalium Ecclesiarum. In 1990, St John Paul II promulgated the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches and five years later, on the centenary of Orientalium dignitas, he published the Apostolic Letter Orientale lumen.
Competence
According to Praedicate Evangelium, “The Dicastery deals with those matters involving persons or things, that affect the Eastern Catholic Churches sui iuris. (art. 82, para.1)
“Art. 84, para. 1: The Dicastery is competent in all matters pertaining to the Eastern Churches that must be referred to the Apostolic See regarding the structure and organization of those Churches; the exercise of the functions of teaching, sanctifying and governing; and the status, rights, and obligations of persons…”
Therefore, it exercises over the eparchies, bishops, clergy, religious, and faithful of the Eastern rite the faculties that the Dicasteries for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, for Bishops, for the Clergy, for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, and for Catholic Education, respectively, exercise over dioceses, bishops, clergy, religious, and faithful of the Latin rite, with certain exceptions.
The Dicastery closely follows the communities of Eastern faithful who are located in the territorial circumscriptions of the Latin Church, known as “the diaspora”. It provides for their spiritual needs through visitors or through its own hierarchy, where the number of faithful and circumstances require it, after consulting the Dicastery responsible for the establishment of particular Churches in the same territory.
In regions where Eastern rites have long been prevalent, the apostolate and missionary activity depend exclusively on this Dicastery, even if they are carried out by faithful of the Latin Church. The Dicastery therefore also has territorial jurisdiction over Latin faithful in Bulgaria, Cyprus, Egypt, Jordan, Greece, Iraq, Iran, Israel, Lebanon, Palestine, Syria and Turkey.
The Dicastery includes the Special Commission for Liturgy, whose task is to safeguard and promote the liturgical heritage of the Christian East, the Special Commission for Studies on the Christian East, and the Special Commission for the Formation of Clergy and Religious, which promotes the formation of Eastern students, especially in Rome.
ROACO (Reunion of Aid Agencies for the Oriental Churches) a committee that brings together agencies and works from various countries around the world engaged in financial support for Eastern Churches in various sectors, from the construction of places of worship to scholarships, from educational and scholastic institutions to those dedicated to social and health care, is chaired by the Prefect and has the Secretary of the Dicastery as its Vice-President.
Finally, this Dicastery has the task of promoting love and ecclesial co-responsibility towards the Holy Land, and to this end, it sends a Circular Letter to all bishops every year in view of the Collection for the Holy Land, to raise awareness among the faithful of the spiritual and material help in favour of Catholic communities and institutions present in the land of Jesus.
Recovering the sense of mystery of the Christian East
In his meeting with pastors and faithful of the Eastern Churches on the occasion of their Jubilee on 14 May 2025, Pope Leo XIV emphasized the importance of recovering a sense of the “mystery” of the Christian East.
“The Church needs you,” he said. “The contribution that the Christian East can offer us today is immense! We have great need to recover the sense of mystery that remains alive in your liturgies, liturgies that engage the human person in his or her entirety, that sing of the beauty of salvation and evoke a sense of wonder at how God’s majesty embraces our human frailty!”
Concluding his address, he thanked the “dear brothers and sisters of the East, the lands where Jesus, the Sun of Justice, dawned, for being ‘lights in our world’,” while expressing his hope that they would continue to be examples of faith, hope, and charity; and that their pastors would promote “communion with integrity, especially in the Synods of Bishops, that they may be places of fraternity and authentic co-responsibility.”
The Pope reiterated this invitation when he met with the members of ROACO on 26 June 2025: “I would like this light of wisdom and salvation to be better known in the Catholic Church, where it is still largely unknown… The Christian East, however, can only be preserved if it is loved, and it can only be loved if it is known… There is also a need for encounter and the sharing of pastoral activity, since Eastern Catholics today are no longer our distant cousins who celebrate unfamiliar rites, but our brothers and sisters who, due to forced migration, are our next-door neighbours. Their sense of the sacred, their deep faith, confirmed by suffering, and their spirituality, redolent of the divine mysteries, can benefit the thirst for God, latent yet at the same present, in the West.”
